Harry Potter 'What If' Plot Bunnies
by OhMyKai
Summary: AU, What if one tiny thing was different in the Harry Potter universe? How much could things have changed?
1. The Secret Letter

**The Secret Letter**  
_What if Harry had been smart enough to hide the first letter he received from Hogwarts and read it in private?_

Harry had never denied the fact that he was strange, but even he couldn't explain what made him different. In his mind, it was a simple truth that people shied away from his abnormalness, that he would never really fit it. He had long ago accepted it as something unchanging. It was easier to keep to yourself and to trust no one else to watch your back.

He had also learned long ago that you didn't have to fight the pointless battles, especially when it came to his 'family.'

He invoked this lesson one morning, in the kitchen. The members of the Dursley Household were just sitting down for breakfast when they heard the click of the mail slot and flop of letters on the doormat.

"Get the mail, Dudley," said Uncle Vernon from behind his paper.

"Make Harry get it."

"Get the mail, Harry."

"Make Dudley get it."

"Poke him with your Smelting stick, Dudley."

Harry, deciding this was a good time to give up a worthless and pointless battle, got up to get the mail. Flipping through some inane letters, he paused at an old looking envelope without a stamp and with emerald-green ink on it.

_Mr. H. Potter_  
_The Cupboard under the Stairs_  
_4 Privet Drive_  
_Little Whinging_  
_Surrey_

The black-haired boy blinked in surprise. He had never before received a letter. Not from friends, nor relatives. Turning the envelope over, his hand trembling, Harry saw a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms; a lion, an eagle, a badger, and a snake surrounding a large letter _H_. He started opening the letter slowly, treasuring the arrival and reading of his first ever letter, no matter how strange.

"Hurry up, boy!" shouted Uncle Vernon from the kitchen. "What are you doing, checking for letter bombs?" He chuckled at his own joke.

Harry quickly shoved the letter into is back pocket, heading to the kitchen to give the remaining letters to his uncle. He would read it later.

* * *

Harry was exhausted. He had spent the rest of his day doing a larger-than-normal list of chores. Aunt Petunia must have been annoyed with something and let it out on him. Perhaps she had seen nothing of interest when she had craned her neck earlier in the afternoon to look into the neighbors' house.

He retired into his bedroom – technically, his cupboard – and pulled out the slightly crumpled letter from his back pocket along with a stolen flashlight.

_HOGWARTS SCHOOL_  
_of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY_

_Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore_  
(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock,  
Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)

_Dear Mr. Potter,_  
_ We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted_  
_at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find_  
_enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment._  
_ Term begins on Septermber 1. We await your owl by no_  
_later than July 31._  
_Yours sincerely,_

_Minerva McGonagall_  
Deputy Headmistress

He noticed vaguely that there was also another paper besides that, one with a list of magical school supplies, like a wand and spellbooks. He noticed, but he didn't comprehend. How could this even be possible? Magic? Did someone really expect him to believe that?

But why would someone go through the effort? He wasn't well liked, true, but he wasn't well known, either. An elaborate prank like this wouldn't be wasted on _him_. And, as illogical as it sounded, it explained some things. It explained why he could do strange things, like growing back his hair and disappearing onto a roof. It explained the reasons he was different, why he was shunned, why he was never allowed to be happy…

He shook his head wildly, tears being held back at the corner of his eyes, hands clenching the letter tightly in his hands.. It was never that easy, not for him! How could someone be that cruel to him? Cruel enough to make him wish for a chance at acceptance for the first time in a long time.

He would have guessed that Dudley made this up, as Harry's pain brought Dudley joy, except Dudley wasn't smart enough for something like this. His cousin might constantly call him a 'freak,' but it really didn't hold any meaning to the boy. He was only repeating what he heard his parents say.

This just didn't make any sense. No one could really know how much a letter like this would affect him, and he knew of no one that would bother spending time making up a letter like this.

It was there, in his tiny, dark, sparse cupboard, clutching a letter and a flashlight as though they were lifelines, hunched over so that only his hair brushed the ceiling, tears close to trailing down his face, that Harry Potter, an eleven year old wizard, the unknowing Boy-Who-Lived, saviour of the wizarding world, defeater of Voldemort, allowed himself a glimmer of hope.

Bringing the letter back up close to his face, the emerald-eyed boy mouthed the words 'await your owl.' It seemed he had work to do…


	2. The Parseltongue Situation

**The Parseltongue Situation**  
_What if Harry had talked to a different snake at the zoo?_

After lunch they went to the reptile house. It was cool and dark in there, with lit windows all along the walls. Behind the glass, all sorts of lizards and snakes were crawling and slithering over bits of wood and stone. Dudley and Piers wanted to see huge, poisonous cobras and thick, man-crushing pythons. Dudley quickly found the largest snake in the place. It could have wrapped its body twice around Uncle Vernon's car and crushed it into a trash can – but at the moment it didn't look in the mood. In fact, it was fast asleep.

And in Harry's modest opinion, not very interesting. What interested him more was the Diamondback Rattlesnake. While it perhaps wasn't as long, it was venomous, and, in Harry's mind, a lot more dangerous.

When Harry went over to look at it, it was hidden deep in some of the fake foilage in it's cage, nearly impossible to spot. The boy cocked his head to the side, full of childish innocence, amazed at what the snake could do.

"_What are you staring at, human?"_

The black-haired child answered automatically. "_The design on your body is amazing." _He continued to study the snake for a moment, marveling at the diamond shapes covering it's almost 6 foot body.

Wait.

Had he just talked to a snake?

"_A speaker?_" If the snake could have showed emotions, it probably would have shown mild curiousity just then. "_How interesting._ _What's a young wizard like you doing here?_"

Harry's eyes darted around the room, making sure no one was watching. "_Wizard? What are you talking about? I'm just…normal._"

"_No non-magical human has ever known the great language of the snakes. You're not normal, boy. Accept that now. Normal has never changed anything in the world, and you could probably do great things, if you stopped being such an unmotivated, uninteresting, bad-at-pretending idiot. Now leave me. I wish to sleep."_

Harry gaped. Was this really happening? Talking to snakes? Wizards? Being told he was an idiot by a caged rattlesnake?

"Stop standing around with your mouth hanging open, boy, and hurry up!" His uncle yelled, making a few young girls near him jump. "We're going back to see the wolves."

Harry followed his only relatives around the zoo on autopilot the rest of the day, wondering all the while if he was completely insane.

* * *

By the time the summer holidays had started, Harry had shrugged it off as his imagination. He had decided that it was just a part of him reaching out, hoping that his life could possibly get better.

That wasn't possible, of course.

Strange letters started arriving, though, all addressed to him. His Uncle Vernon managed to keep all of them away and burned them, but the emerald-eyed boy was burning with curiousity. The only time his Aunt and Uncle acted like this was when they spoke of his 'freakishness.' What if it was something to do with that?

Eventually, his Uncle got so fed up that they left the house. The eve before his birthday, Harry stayed awake, laying on a hard floor, cold, with only a ragged blanket to cover him. He was on his back, staring at his watch, hoping for…something. Something better than what he had now.

Five minutes to go. Harry heard something creak outside. He hoped the roof wasn't going to fall in, although he might be warmed if it did. Four minutes to go. Maybe the house in Privet Drive would be so full of letters when they got back that he'd be able to steal one somehow.

Three minutes to go. Was that the sea, slapping hard on the rock like that? And (two minutes go go) what was that funny crunching noise? Was the rock crumbling into the sea?

One minute to go and he'd be eleven. Thirty seconds…twenty…ten…nine – maybe he'd wake Dudley up, just to annoy him – three…two…one…

BOOM.

The whole shack shivered and Harry sat bolt upright, staring at the door. Someone was outside, knocking to come in.

A few minutes later found Harry sitting next to a warm fire, trying to comprehend what a giant of a man was saying.

"Ah, go boil yer heads, both of yeh," said Hagrid. "Harry – yer a wizard."

There was a silence inside the hut. Only the sea and the whistling wind could be heard.

"Wiz-wizard? As in magic?" he managed to croak out.

"O' course."

"Then…then he was telling the truth! I'm not normal! I'm…I'm not normal," Harry was mumbling to himself by then. Hagrid stared at him strangely.

"Can we leave now?" the young wizard asked suddenly.

"I don't- What? There's a huge storm out there, Harry, and I reckon it's really not safe."

"You can do magic, can't you?" he asked impatiently. "I don't want to stay with them," he jerked his head towards his relatives, "any longer than I have to. So can we leave?"

The Keeper of the Keys was staring at him, eyes wide.

"Yeah, alright. It'll take a mo,' though, I need to make sure the boat's goin' to be safe for us."

Harry smiled to himself as they walked out the door, pulling the thin blanket around his shoulders tighter. He'd have to go back and thank that snake someday. He'd become great, he was sure of it.


	3. The Longer Conversation

**The Longer Conversation**  
_What if Madam Malkin took longer to get Harry's robe right, and Harry had a longer conversation with Draco Malfoy in Diagon Alley?_

"Hogwarts, dear?" she said, when Harry started to speak. "Got the lot here – another young man being fitted up just now, in fact."

In the back of the shop, a boy with a pale, pointed face was standing on a footstool while a second witch pinned up his long black robes. Madam Malkin stood Harry on a stool next to him, slipped a long robe over his head, and began to pin it to the right length.

"Hello," said the boy, "Hogwarts, too?"

"Yes," said Harry.

"My father's next door buying my books and mother's up the street looking at wands," said the boy. He had a bored, drawling voice. "Them I'm going to drag them off to look at racing brooms. I don't see why first years can't have their own. I think I'll bully father into getting me one and I'll smuggle it in somehow."

Harry was strongly reminded of Dudley. He managed to live through several minutes of feeling like an idiot as the boy talked about Kidditch, or something, and houses like Hufferpuff and Slytherin. After he insulted Hagrid, though, his first friend, Harry started getting ticked off.

Harry turned towards the boy, not paying enough attention. Madam Malkin dropped her wand, and when it hit the ground, and bright light shot out of the tip, and his robe started shrinking. Madam Malkin got a cross look on her face.

"My dear, you can't move so much while I'm measuring. I'm going to have to start over now, so please keep still."

Harry apologized and only moved his head when he turned to the boy again. "Frankly, I have no idea what you're talking about. I've just learned about the wizarding world last night, so either stop talking or explain things." Harry usually wouldn't be so impolite, but Harry had decided that he had to start off strong in the school year, so he wouldn't get pushed around in Hogwarts. He had a chance to start over again.

The boy immediately got a look of disdain on his face. "You're a mudblood, then?"

"Meaning what exactly?" Harry asked impatiently, extremely fed up with the boy.

The boy looked close to yelling at him, though Harry wasn't sure why. He wasn't as rude as the boy. "Muggleborn."

"No, my parents were magical. I was just raised by my muggle relatives."

The boy's disdain faded somewhat, but it was still there. "What is your surname, then? Mine is Malfoy. You should remember it."

Harry tried not to sneer at the arrogant brat – there was no other way to describe him. But before Harry could answer, Madam Malkin said, "That's you done, my dear," and Harry, not sorry for an excuse to stop talking to the boy, hopped down from the footstool and rushed out to where Hagrid was waiting for him.

* * *

Harry was really hoping that the train ride would be over soon. He had gotten a compartment to himself like he had wanted, but another boy has asked to sit with him. He couldn't really say no, right? That'd be a bit too rude.

The boy was a tad annoying, though. Their conversation so far had been rather tedious and uninteresting on Harry's part. The boy, Ron Weasel or something, had gawked at him, got embarassed when he basically admitted he was poor, talked about his rat, and fell for an obviously fake spell even though he had been around magic his entire life. Harry was beginning to think the boy – Ron – was an idiot.

Just when he was beginning to calm down after listening to that bushy-haired know-it-all, three boys entered, and Harry recognized the middle one at once: it was the pale boy from Madam Malkin's robe shop. He was looking at Harry with a lot more interest than he'd shown back in Diagon Alley.

"Is it true?" he said. "They're saying all down the train that Harry Potter's in this compartment. So it's you, is it?"

"Yes," said Harry. He was looking at the other boys. Both of them were thickset and looked extremely mean. Standing on either side of the pale boy, they looked like bodyguards.

"Oh, this is Crabbe and this is Goyle," said Malfoy carelessly, noticing where Harry was looking. "And you remember my name, don't you? Malfoy. Draco Malfoy."

Ron looked wildly around, fixing his stare on Harry after a moment. "You two know each other? You know _Malfoy_?"

Draco looked at him. "Think my name's funny, do you? No need to ask who you are. My father told me all the Weasleys have red hair, freckles, and more children than they can afford."

Harry patience was at an end, and he stood up and faced both boys. "You two have never met each other in your entire lives, have you? How can you say those things as though you know each other? You both sound like brainless prejudiced parrots, who repeat exactly what their parents say. I'm done, and hopefully I'm sorted into a different house than both of you idiots."

Ignoring the shocked looks, Harry walked down the hallway to find another compartment. As he walked, he meditated on how rude he had been lately. Maybe magic affected the brain?

Harry spent the rest of the train ride with Cedric Diggory, who promised to explain everything about the school to him, along with the Weasley twins and Lee Jordan, who jumped at the chance to talk to the Boy-Who-Lived. Harry thought they were just trying to convince him to get sorted into Gryffindor. After hearing that Ron would likely get sorted into that house, though, he was thinking Ravenclaw was the best house for him.


	4. The Keys

**The Keys**  
_What if Harry asked about his key during his trip with Hagrid at Gringotts?_

Harry was simply amazed. Diagon Alley was as great as Hagrid had explained, and now he had officially seen his first magical creature; a goblin! Who would have thought they'd be that short?

Just now, Harry was with Hagrid in Gringotts, waiting patiently to see where the heck he was going to get money. Him? Money? They'd never gotten along well.

"Morning," said Hagrid to a free goblin. "We've come ter take some money outta Mr. Harry Potter's safe."

"You have his key, sir?"

"Got it here somewhere," said Hagrid, and he started emptying his pockets onto the counter, scattering a handful of moldy dog biscuits over the goblin's book of numbers. The goblin wrinkled his nose. Harry watched the goblin on their right weighing a pile of rubies as big as glowling coals.

"Got it," said Hagrid at last, holding up a tiny golden key.

"The goblin looked at it closely.

"That seems to be in order."

"An' I've also-"

"Uhh…Hagrid?" asked Harry, interrupting. "Why do you have my key?"

"Dumbledore entrusted meh with it," said Hagrid, puffing out his chest alarmingly.

"Then why did Dumbledore have it?"

"Well, he's Dumbledore," was the confused reply. The goblin watched with interest.

"The Headmaster to my school, not my guardian, right?"

"Yeah," Hagrid said, nodding. "But he's Dumbledore."

"And I'm Harry," said Harry, bothered by Hagrid's unquestioning loyalty. Turning towards the goblin with Harry's key still in hand, he asked, "I, or my guardian, should be the one holding onto my key, right?"

"That's correct."

"So why does he have it?"

"I have no information with me, but if I recall correctly…All of your possible godparents on your parent's will became unable caretakers for a variety of reasons. You had to live with your mother's sister, yes?" The goblin waited for Harry's nod. "With no other possible guardians assigned by your parents, she was the only choice as your last living relative." The goblin peered at him over the top of his glasses. "As she is a muggle, Dumbledore was able to convince the Ministry that she was unfit to hold onto your key. He managed to claim it, and there is only so much we goblins can do against the Ministry."

Throughout the entire explanation, Hagrid stayed to the side, seemingly deciding to stay quiet, and the black-haired boy's face grew increasingly thoughtful. "So I can keep the key now, right?"

"Along with your other key, yes," was the quick reply.

"Other key?" asked Harry, startled.

"You had not known? This key," the goblin said, holding up the key Hagrid had given him, "is for your trust vault only. There is also the Potter family vault, currently unclaimed. The process to claim it is moderately harder than your trust vault, but it will have more than just money in it. Furthermore, by claiming it, you have the possibility of being accepted at an early age as the head of the family, and becoming emancipated."

Hagrid spoke up again, the first time in a while. "But I thought that wasn't possible now, you need ta' be at least seventeen?"

The goblin nodded at him. "That is usually the case, but the circumstances surrounding Mr. Potter here are rather…strange. With no other living heirs of the vault, no magical guardian, an unclaimed fortune, and Mr. Potter's likely strong magical forte, he is able to claim it at age eleven, the standard British age to start school."

"Right then," said Harry, shaking himself out of his shock. "I'd like to claim my family vault and see to my trust vault. If possible, I'd also like to try to become the head of the Potter family and become emancipated."

The goblin seemed pleased, if that was possible. "Follow me." Standing up, the goblin called another to replace him and beckoned for Harry and Hagrid to follow into another room.

"You know," said Harry, making sure he wouldn't be overheard. "I think I'm beginning to like goblins."


	5. The Different Chocolate Frog

**The Different Chocolate Frog**  
_What if when Harry had his first chocolate frog, the card that came with it wasn't Dumbledore?_

"What are these?" Harry asked Ron, holding up a pack of Chocolate Frogs. "They're not _really _frogs, are they?" He was starting to feel that nothing would surprise him.

"No," said Ron. "But see what the card is. I'm missing Agrippa."

"What?"

"Oh, of course you wouldn't know – Chocolate Frogs have cards inside them, you know, to collect – famous witches and wizards. I've got about five hundred, but I still haven't got Agrippa or Ptolemy."

Harry unwrapped his Chocolate Frog and picked up the card. It showed a boy's face, scrawny with very pale skin. His glasses somewhat reflected the bright eyes behind the lenses, intense emerald-green eyes. The hair was messy enough to show most of the forehead, giving a good view of the strangely shaped scar, a scar that Harry was extremely familiar with. It was a picture of him from about a year ago, from the looks.

HARRY POTTER  
_the boy-who-lived_

The only known person to have ever survived the  
Killing Curse, Harry is considered the vanquisher of  
Voldemort. He is easily spotted by his lightening  
shaped scar on his forehead, and holds the record  
of being "Wizard of the Year" by _Witch Weekly _most  
times in a row at 4 years.

Harry enjoys long walks on the beach and Quidditch.

"_What?_"

Ron looked up from his Morgana Chocolate Frog card. "Oh, you found your own card, though it's not that surprising. They're almost as common as Dumbledore's. My sister actually has a collection of your cards – it's kind of weird."

"Is it even legal for them to have a card of me without my consent? And what's that supposed to mean – long walks on the beach and Quidditch? I've never been to a beach in my life, and I don't even know what Quidditch is!"

"You don't know what Quidditch is?" asked a dumbfounded Ron, not really hearing anything else the hysterical Harry said.

"No, I don't…But that's not the point! They've been making money off of me for years, and this is the first time I've even heard about it."

"Uhh…so? What're you going to do about it?"

"_I _should be making money off of this. _They _should be telling the truth, not some crap like this!"

"Why would you make money off of it, though? You should consider yourself lucky to even be on one of those cards!"

"They're using my image to make money! Of course I should get some of it. I could probably sue them, too, now that I think about it."

"If you say so, mate."

* * *

"Potter, Harry!"

"As Harry stepped forward, whispers suddenly broke out like little hissing fires all over the hall.

"_Potter_, did she say?"

"_The _Harry Potter?"

The last thing Harry saw before the hat dropped over his eyes was the hall full of people craning to get a good look at him. Next second he was looking at the black inside of the hat. He waited.

"Hmm," said a small voice in his ear. "Difficult. Very difficult. Plenty of courage, I see. Not a bad mind, either. There's talent, oh my goodness, yes – and a nice thirst to prove yourself, now that's interesting…So where shall I put you?"

Harry gripped the edges of the stool, still annoyed at the earlier events with the Chocolate Frog. _Does it matter? From what I heard, it doesn't matter what house I'll be put into, everyone will immediately form their own opinion of me, anyways. And it's stupid to be put into houses based off of our personalities, we should be mixed up so that the loyal ones don't just stay loyal, but get some smarts and some bravery or whatever. And even while one characteristic might stick out more right now, that doesn't mean that two years from now that characteristic will still be the strongest…I might change to be more knowledge hungry instead of just loyal, right? And besides that–_

"I understand your points, young Mr. Potter," the Sorting Hat replied in his ear, cutting off his rant. It sounded amused, for a hat. "That doesn't change the fact that I must sort you."

_Why?_

"That is the purpose for which I was made, Mr. Potter. I must sort every student who enters this school."

_So it's impossible for you to not sort me?_

"Ahh…but you could do great in all of the houses. You have a great mind, Mr. Potter. Do you truly not wish to be sorted?"

_I don't want to be confined to a single house. Everything I've seen in the wizarding world so far has been biased and unfair. Change can start with something small like this._

"I hope you don't mind becoming even more famous than you are now, then, Mr. Potter, and use that fame instead of shying away from it. This has never before happened to any of the Hogwarts students. Never. You're lucky I like you, so see if you can visit me some time. You might need me for advice anyways; no one can see into your mind as good as me, and you have some rough times ahead, you know. Good luck. Better be…NO HOUSE!"

Harry lifted the hat to look at the shocked faces around him.


	6. The Little Lost Boy

**The Little Lost Boy**  
_What if Harry had gotten really fed up on the first day at Hogwarts about getting lost on the way to classes?_

Whispers followed Harry from the moment he left his dormitory the next day. People lining up outside classrooms stood on tiptoe to get a look at him, or doubled back to pass him in the corridors again, staring. Harry wished they wouldn't, because he was trying to concentrate on finding his way to classes.

There were a hundred and forty-two staircases at Hogwarts: wide, sweeping ones; narrow, rickety ones; some that led somewhere different on Friday; some with a vanishing step halfway up that you had to remember to jump. Then there were doors that wouldn't open unless you asked politely, or tickled them in exactly the right place, and doors that weren't really doors at all, but solid walls just pretending. It was also hard to remember where anything was, because it all seemed to move around a lot. The people in the portraits kept going to visit each other, and Harry was sure the coats of armor could walk.

The ghosts didn't help, either. It was always a nasty shock when one of them glided suddenly through a door you were trying to open. Nearly Headless Ncik was always happy to point new Gryffindors in the right direction, but Peeves the Poltergeist was worth two locked doors and a trick staircase if you met him when you were late for class. He would drop wastepaper baskets on your head, pull rugs from under your feet, pelt you with bits of chalk, or sneak up behind you, invisible, grab your nose, and screech, "GOT YOUR CONK!"

Even worse than Peeves, if that was possible, was the caretaker, Argus Filch. Harry and Ron managed to get on the wrong side of him on their very first morning. Filch found them trying to force their way through a door that unluckily turned out to be the entrance to the out-of-bounds corridor on the third floor. He wouldn't believe they were lost, was sure they were trying to break into it on purpose, and was threatening to lock them in the dungeons when they were rescued by Professor Quirrell, who was passing.

Filch owned a cat called Mrs. Norris, a scrawny, dust-colored creature with bulging, lamplike eyes just like Filch's. She patrolled the corridors alone. Break a rule in front of her, put just one toe out of line, and she'd whisk off for Filch, who'd appear, wheezing, two seconds later. Filch knew the secret passageways of the school better than anyone (except perhaps the Weasley twins) and could pop up as suddenly as any of the ghosts. The students all hated him, and it was the dearest ambition of many to give Mrs. Norris a good kick.

It was easy to conclude that Harry wasn't exactly happy with that. As of now, he both loved and hated the school. But when on the first day he got bombed with a water balloon and stuck in a classroom where the door refused to let him leave when he was on his way to the Great Hall, he decided enough was enough. After a star-struck older student cast a drying charm on him, he went to lunch with about 10 minutes left, grumbling to himself all the way.

With little to none seats left, he fortunately (or unfortunately) managed to find seats by Percy, Fred, and George. The twins seemed to have been bugging Percy about him being prefect a moment before, but stopped in favor of Harry.

"What's got you down in the dumps, old boy?"

"It's your first day of school! You should be–"

"Awed and amazed at the sights! Not looking–"

"Like someone told you Christmas wasn't coming this year!"

"I'm tired of getting lost around the school!" Harry said, uncaging his emotions. "And I'm tired of running into Peeves! I've already been pranked by him 5 times today!" As he finished, he let his head drop down to bang on the table. Students watched on in interest, and Harry could have sworn he saw the flash of a camera from the Hufflepuff table. He turned to glare in that direction. "We should have a week just to figure our way around the school, or a map, or something! They shouldn't expect new students to find their way around so fast."

Harry missed the glance the twins shot each other. He did notice, though, when each twin grabbed an armpit each and frogmarched him out of the Great Hall, ignoring the bemused students wondering what awful thing was going to happen to their precious Boy-Who-Lived.

"Hey! I haven't gotten a chance to eat yet. Hey! Let…me…go!" Harry panted as the twins dropped him on a desk in an abandoned classroom. "What was that for?"

"We've got something for you, Harry," the twin on the left said, eyes dancing.

"The secret of our success!" The twin – Fred, he thought - on the right pulled something from inside his cloak with a flourish and laid it on one of the desks. It was a large, square, very worn piece of parchment with nothing written on it. Harry, already distrustful of the twins due to the wild rumors from around the school, stared at it.

"We decided your need was greater than ours!"

"We know it by heart, anyways…"

"And what do I need with a bit of old parchment?" said Harry.

"A bit of old parchment!" said George – Fred? – closing his eyes with a grimace as though Harry had mortally offended him. "Explain, George."

"Well…when we were in our first year, Harry – young, carefree, and innocent-"

Harry snorted, waiting for their point.

"-well, more innocent than we are now – we got into a spot of bother with Filch."

"We let off a Dungbomb in the corridor and it upset him for some reason-"

"So he hauled us off to his office and started threatening us with the usual-"

"-detention-"

"-disembowlment-"

"-and we couldn't help noticing a drawer in one of his filing cabinets marked _Confiscated and Highly Dangerous_."

"So…That prompted you to stick your hand in a drawer that was liable to bite your hand off, right?"

"Well, what would you've done?" said Fred. "George caused a diversion by dropping another Dungbomb, I whipped the drawer open, and grabbed – _this_. And my hand was back to normal a few days later."

"It's not as bad as it sounds, you know," said George. "We don't reckon Filch ever found out how to work it. He probably suspected what it was, though, or he wouldn't have confiscated it."

"Still waiting for the point."

"Yes, yes, my dear Harrikins. Filch might not have figured it out, but this little beauty's taught us more than all the teachers in this school."

He took out his wand, touched the parchment lightly, and said, "_I solemnly swear that I am up to no good._"

And at once, think ink lines began to spread like a spider's webfrom the point that George's wand had touched. They joined each other, they crisscrossed, they fanned into every corner of the parchment; then words began to blossom across the top, great, curly green words, that proclaimed:

_Messrs. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs  
Purveyors of Aids to Magical Mischief-Makers  
are proud to present_  
**THE MARAUDER'S MAP**

As Harry stared in awe at it, the twins spoke up again.

"Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs," sighed George, patting the heading of the map. "We owe them so much."

"Noble men, working tirelessly to help a new generation of law-breakers," said Fred solemnly.

"Wait, wait, wait…why are you just giving this to me? You just met me. You don't know me. And even if you did memorize this whole thing – which I doubt – that doesn't replace the little moving people."

"Like we said, Harrikins, your need is greater than ours."

"That's bloody stupid. Haven't you tried copying it?"

"Of course we have."

"Then obviously you didn't try hard enough. If it's a map like this, it's probably from students in the past, so they probably weren't much more advanced than you two, and you're both really creative, too, right? There has to be something, 'cause figuring out how they made it has to be easier than actually making it, right? So figure it out, I don't want it otherwise. Pretty cool map, though."

The twins watched with slack jaws as Harry walked out of the classroom to rush and arrive late to his next class.


	7. The Irksome Classes

**The Irksome Classes**  
_What if Harry got a bit too irritated with some of his professors' teaching styles?_

There was a lot more to magic, as Harry quickly found out, than waving your wand and saying a few funny words.

They had to study the night skies through their telescopes every Wednesday at midnight and learn the names of different stars and the movements of the planets. Three times a week they went out to the greenhouses behind the castle to study Herbology, with a dumpy little witch called Professor Sprout, where they learned how to take care of all the strange plants and fungi, and found out what they were used for.

Easily the most boring class was History of Magic, which was the only one taught by a ghost. Professor Binns had been very old indeed when he had fallen asleep in front of the staff room fire and got up next morning to teach, leaving his body behind him. Binns droned on and on while they scribbled down names and dates, and got Emeric the Evil and Uric the Oddball mixed up.

Professor Flitwick, the Charms teacher, was a tiny little wizard who had to stand on a pile of books to see over his desk. At the start of their first class he took the roll call, and when he reached Harry's name he gave an excited squeak and toppled out of sight.

Professor McGonagall was again different. Harry had been quite right to think she wasn't a teacher to cross. Strict and clever, she gave them a talking-to the moment they sat down in her first class.

The class everyone had really been looking forward to was Defense Against the Dark Arts, but Quirrell's lessons turned out to be a bit of a joke. He constantly smelled of garlic and they never actually practiced any of the spells they learned the theory of.

Potions was a class Harry had been looking forward to. He had always liked Science class, and he thought it might be a bit like the cooking he had grown to love. He was sorely disappointed, though. The teacher, Professor Snape, was completely biased against Gryffindors, hovered over them without teaching them, asked questions Harry likely wouldn't have known the answers to, and seemed to have a grudge against Harry himself.

Suffice to say, Harry wasn't very happy with his classes. He loved the castle and the new friends he was making, but he had come to Hogwarts to _learn_, and that wouldn't happen the way things were going.

He decided to do something about it.

He set up a meeting with his Head of House, Professor McGonagall for that weekend. By the time the weekend came around, he had already planned exactly what he was going to say.

"Mr. Potter? Did you have a particular reason for asking to talk with me? Are you not settling in well?"

"Yes, ma'am. I like Hogwarts a lot and I think I could easily get used to magic…but that's kind of the problem. I don't think the classes are turning out so well for me…"

"Mr. Potter, all muggle-raised students go through this phase. Those coming from a magical family aren't actually that much ahead of you, so you shouldn't feel embarassed about asking questions."

"That's not quite it, ma'am," he said, smiling apologetically at her. "I don't feel I'm learning enough in all of my classes, because I don't feel that all of the professors quite meet my standards…No offense, I hope."

His professor's mouth thinned. "I assure you, Mr. Potter, that all of the teachers are certified, they each have at least a Mastery of the subject they teach."

"I hadn't meant that they didn't know what they were teaching, ma'am, just that they are bad at actually teaching it."

"Explain."

"Er…well, History of Magic is probably the worst class. I enjoy learning history, but it's hard to even stay awake in that class, and I don't believe the Professor even knows any of our names. Besides that, shouldn't the information he's teaching be a little more…recent? While I'm sure goblin wars are fascinating, I was hoping to learn more about the world I was entering and it's witches and wizards…Though I suppose it would be kind of creepy if the 'Boy-Who-Lived' came up in any of the lessons.

"'Sides that, I think Astronomy is pretty good, Professor Sinistra is good at teaching. But I saw when I was in Diagon Alley that it's possible to have a moving model of the galaxy in a large glass ball. It's cool and all to go out at night, but I still have classes the next day. So couldn't we just get a couple of class sets and go out in the middle of the night only sometimes?

"Defense Against the Dark Arts is completely useless, if I can be so blunt. We don't actually learn anything except the theory…Y'know, the teacher should be a lot more like Flitwick or you, who gives us the theory, goes through the motions, lets us practice it, then corrects us. And why is it Defense Against the 'Dark Arts' anyways? I don't know what the dark arts are even supposed to be…

"And then there's Potions. I was going to the class hoping I could learn a lot, since I think I could really like it…But so far, Professor Snape has been really prejudiced and hasn't actually taught us anything. He just gives us the instructions and expects us to do it. If everyone taught like that, no new potions would ever be invented again. I wanna know _why _I need to stir it clockwise 15 times, why I'm adding this and that…Shouldn't he be teaching that?

"So just to point out, if this is how my years at Hogwarts are going to be, I'm probably not going to stay here very long."

His Head of House listened to his entire rant patiently, a strange look on her face. Looking like she was processing everything Harry had said about the teachers, she replied to his last sentence first. "Your parents would have wanted you to be at Hogwarts, Mr. Potter."

"Y'know, people keep saying that to me, but I think they'd just want me to be happy, and I think I'd be happy with the best education I can get."

McGonagall nodded, her mind made up. "If you really are interested in pursuing this further, I can set up a meeting with the Headmaster, and you can explain your issues with the faculty to him. If you aren't satisfied by the results, I promise you that I'll help you find a new school myself."

A small, completely genuine smile lit up the boy's face. "Thanks, Professor."


	8. The Peacemaker

**The Peacemaker**  
_What if Harry decided Ron went a bit too far when he insulted Hermione?_

"Now, don't forget that nice wrist movements we've been practicing!" squeaked Professor Flitwick, perched on top of his pile of books as usual. "Swish and flick, remember, swish and flick. And saying the magic words properly is very important, too – never forget Wizard Baruffio, who said 's' instead of 'f' and found himself on the floor with a buffalo on his chest."

It was very difficult. Harry and Seamus swished and flicked, but the feather they were supposed to be sending skyward just lay on the desktop. Seamus got so impatient that he prodded it with his wand and set fire to it – Harry had to put it out with his hat.

Ron, at the next table, wasn't having much more luck.

"_Wingardium Leviosa!" _he shouted, waving his long arms like a windmill.

"You're saying it wrong," Harry heard Hermione snap. "It's Wing-_gar_-dium Levi-_o_-sa, make the 'gar' nice and long."

"You do it then, if you're so clever," Ron snarled.

Hermione rolled up the sleeves of her gown, flicked her wand, and said, "_Wingardium Leviosa!_"

Their feather rose off the desk and hovered about four feet above their heads.

"Oh, well done!" cried Professor Flitwick, clapping. "Everyone see here, Miss Granger's done it!"

Ron was in a very bad mood by the end of the class.

"It's no wonder no one can stand her," he said to Harry as they pushed their way into the crowded corridor, "she's a nightmare, honestly."

Someone knocked into Harry as they hurried past him. It was Hermione. Harry caught a glimpse of her face – and was startled to see that she was in tears.

"Hermione, wait!" Harry said, grabbing her arm before she could run.

"Why, so you can make fun of me some more?" Hermione's face was blotchy and her eyes were already red from the tears.

"No! No, I just want to talk," he assured her. He looked at his friend. "Ron, I'll catch up to you soon, alright?" Ron took the hint and left, glancing behind him as he walked.

"What do you want?" she muttered, looking at the ground now.

"Just to talk," he repeated. "Look, he shouldn't have said that. Ron's in Gryffindor for a reason though, you know? He said it without thinking, I know he wouldn't have said it otherwise."

"It's still what he thinks, isn't it? That I'm a stuck-up know-it-all."

"He might think that a little bit, yeah," he said uncomfortably. "But for the most part, I think he's just jealous that everything comes so easily to you, especially since he grew up in a wizarding home and you didn't. He thinks he should be teaching you how to do everything."

"That's just silly," she said, finally looking up.

"Yeah, I guess. But he's eleven, right?"

"So are you," she said suspiciously. "Why are you doing all this?"

He shrugged, uncomfortable again. "You didn't deserve that. It's sometimes annoying the way you always try to answer so many things in class – no offense – but we're housemates and everything. And I don't like bullies much."

"You? Having trouble with bullies? I doubt that," Hermione said, laughing a little, tears forgotten.

"You'd be surprised," Harry muttered, missing the strange looked that crossed over her face at his words. "Walk with me to Herbology? Hopefully we won't be too late and not get too many points from Gryffindor." Hermione nodded and fell into step beside him, both at ease with the companionable silence.

* * *

A thousand live bats fluttered from the walls and ceiling while a thousand more swooped over the tables in low black clouds, making the candles in the pumpkins stutter. The feast appeared suddednly on the golden plates, as it had at the start-of-term banquet.

Harry was just helping himself to a baked potato when Professor Quirrell came sprinting into the hall, his turban askew and terror on his face. Everyone stared as he reached Professor Dumbledore's chair, slumped against the table, and gasped, "Troll – in the dungeons – thought you ought to know."

He then sank to the floor in a dead faint.

There was an uproar. It took several purple firecrackers exploding from the end of Professor Dumbledore's wand to bring silence.

"Prefects," he rumbled, "lead your Houses back to the dormitories immediately."

"Why?" In the silence, Hermione's voice rang out loudly. "Isn't it just as safe here? And I thought the Slytherin dormitories were in the dungeons, where the _troll _is." Her voice trembled a bit when she said the word troll.

Professor Dumbledore nodded thoughtfully. "I see what you are saying, Miss Granger. Severus, Minerva, follow me, please. Pomona, Filius, watch over the students."

The students stayed eerily silent for a moment as they watched the three professors stride towards the large doors, then broke out in fierce whispers.

Harry turned towards Ron, whose freckles were standing out alarmingly on his extremely pale face. "How could a troll have gotten in?"

Hermione answered his question, her face even whiter than Ron's. Harry didn't want to know how is own looked at the moment. He figured it might be a bit green. "According to _Hogwarts; A History, _the wards around the school should have stopped it. Which means the only way it could have possibly gotten in is if someone let it in."

Harry and Ron exchanged dark looks.

The trio turned towards the head table as they heard some groaning from the man lying on the floor; it seemed Professor Quirrell was coming around. He glanced around at the students blankly for a moment before he suddenly got to his feet.

"I s-should go h-help them stop the t-t-t-troll."

"I'm sure Professor Dumbledore is able to take care of a troll," Professor Sprout said concernedly. "And you just regained consciousness, you should probably sit down."

Professor Quirrell looked like he might force the issue for a moment before he nodded his assent and walked around the table to retake his seat.

Ron looked bored with the exchange, Hermione worried for her professor, but Harry was confused. If Quirrell fainted just from the sight of a troll, why did he want to help so badly? He shook his head bemusedly and turned back towards his now cold potato.


	9. The Would–Be Killers

**The Would-Be Killers**  
_What if Hermione and Ron noticed Quirrell cursing Harry's broom?_

It was as Harry dodged another Bludger, which went spinning dangerously past his head, that it happened. His broom gave a sudden, frightening lurch. For a split second, he thought he was going to fall. He gripped the broom tightly with both his hands and knees. He'd never felt anything like that.

It happened again. It was as though the broom was trying to buck him off. But Nimbus Two Thousands did not suddenly decide to buck him off. Harry tried to turn back toward the Gryffindor goal posts – he had half a mind to ask Wood to call time-out – and then he realized that his broom was completely out of his control. He couldn't turn it. He couldn't direct it at all. It was zigzagging through the air, and every now and then making violent swishing movements that almost unseated him.

Lee was still commenting.

"Slytherin in possession – Flint with the Quaffle – passes Spinnet – passes Bell – hit hard in the face by a Bludger, hope it broke his nose – only joking, Professor – Slytherins score – oh no…"

The Slytherins were cheering. No one seemed to have noticed that Harry's broom was behaving strangely. It was carrying him slowly higher, away from the game, jerking and twitching as it went.

"Dunno what Harry thinks he's doing," Hagrid mumbled. He stared through his binoculars. "If I didn't know better, I'd say he'd lost control of his broom…but he can't have…"

Suddenly, people were pointing up at Harry all over the stands. His broom had started to roll over and over, with him only just managing to hold on. Thenthe whole crowd gasped. Harry's broom had given a wild jerk and Harry swung off it. He was now dangling from it, holding on with only one hand.

"Did something happen to it when Flint blocked him?" Seamus whispered.

"Can't have," Hagrid said, his voice shaking. "Can't nothing interfere with a broomstick except powerful Dark magic – no kid could do that to a Nimbus Two Thousand."

At these words, Hermione seized Hagrid's binoculars, but instead of looking at Harry, she started looking frantically at the crowd.

"What are you doing?" moaned Ron, gray-faced.

"I knew it," Hermione gasped, "Snape – look." Ron made a grab at the binoculars, but Hermione shrunk away. "Quirrell, too. But how?" She trailed off, muttering to herself.

Ron finally got hold of the binoculars. Snape was in the middle of the stands opposite them. He had his eyes fixed on Harry and was muttering nonstop under his breath. Ron swung the binoculars around to look at Quirrell. He was the same as Snape, with his hand twitching as though it wanted to make a grab for his wand.

"What's going on?" Ron asked, directing his question at Hermione, voice shaky.

"Jinx and counter-jinx. I don't know which is doing, which though. If we stop the person doing the counter-jinx first, Harry could be in serious trouble." She ran a hand through her hair, frustated. Her face had a look of deep concentration.

"I got it!" Hermione snapped her fingers, looking up.

"What should we do?"

"Leave it to me."

Before Ron could say another word, Hermione had disappeared. Ron turned the binoculars back on Harry. His broom was vibrating so hard, it was almost impossible for him to hand on much longer. The whole crowd was on its feet, watching, terrified, as the Weasleys flew up to try and pull Harry safely onto one of their brooms, but it was no good – every time they got near him, the broom would jump higher still. They dropped lower and circled beneath him, obviously hoping to catch him if he fell. Marcus Flint seized the Quaffle and scored five times without anyone noticing.

"Come on, Hermione," Ron muttered desperately.

Hermione had fought her way across to the stand where her two professors stood, and was now racing along the row behind him. She made her way to standing in between the two, noticed by no one around her, and prepared herself to be quick.

"_Petrificus Totalus_," she murmered at Quirrell, as quiet as she could make it. She snapped her wand to face Snape, performing the same spell in quick succession. Hermione then immediately began running fast and quiet back towards her seat before any of the surrounding witches and wizards could noticed what she had done.

It was enough. Up in the air, Harry was suddenly able to clamber back on to his broom.

"Neville, you can look!" Ron said. Neville had been sobbing into Hagrid's jacket for the last five minutes.

Harry was speeding toward the ground when the crowd saw him clap his hand to his mouth as though he were about to be sick – he hit the field on all fours – coughed – and something gold fell into his hand.

"I've got the Snitch!" he shouted, waving it above his head, and the game ended in complete confusion.

"He didn't _catch _it, he nearly _swallowed _it," Flint was still howling twenty minutes later, but it made no difference – Harry hadn't broken any rules and Lee Jordan was still happily shouting the results – Gryffindor had won by one hundred and seventy point to sixty. Harry heard none of this, though. He was being made a cup of strong tea back in Hagrid's hut, with Ron and Hermione.

"It was Snape," Ron was explaining, "Or Quirrell, I guess. Hermione and I saw them. One was cursing your broomstick, and one was trying to save you, both staring at you and muttering all the while. I'd put my bets on Snape being the one cursing you, though."

"Don't say that yet, Ron. We need to keep on eye on both. It was strange, the way Quirrell was acting. You know how in class he barely performs any spells because he even stutters over those? He was cursing – or counter-cursing – Harry with no stutters at all, and he was calm and everything. But then again, I can't see Snape saving you either." Hermione frowned, wanting to solve this puzzle.

The conversation was an interesting one, with the trio staying in Hagrid's hut for another half hour or so. It involved Hagrid defending the two professors, a Cerberus named Fluffy, and more knowledge on whatever was being hidden in the school.

They now had a name to work off of. _Nicolas Flamel._


	10. The Reminding Mirror

**The Reminding Mirror**  
_What if Harry talked to Dumbledore more about the Mirror of Erised?_

That third night he found his way more quickly than before. He was walking so fast he knew he was making more noise than was wise, but he didn't meet anyone.

And there were his mother and father smiling at him again, and one of his grandfathers nodding happily. Harry sank down to sit on the floor in front of the mirror. There was nothing to stop him from staying here all night with his family. Nothing at all.

Except–

"So – back again, Harry?"

Harry felt as though his insides had turned to ice. He looked behind him. Sitting on one of the desks by the wall was none other than Albus Dumbledore. Harry must have walked straight past him, so desperate to get to the mirror he hadn't noticed him.

"I – I didn't see you, sir."

"Strange how nearsighted being invisible can make you," said Dumbledore, and Harry was relieved to see that he was smiling.

"So," said Dumbledore, slipping off the desk to sit on the floor with Harry, "you, like hundreds before you, have discovered the delights of the Mirror of Erised."

"I didn't know it was called that, sir."

"But I except you've realized by now what it does?"

Harry turned back to the mirror. He had studied it when Ron had been admiring himself in the mirror, and finally realized what it was supposed to do. He felt foolish for not having figured it out earlier. He knew Hermione would have been able to get it right away. "Is how not your face be, but your heart's desire," he said simply.

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled in the dim room. "Good, Harry. Your deepest, most desperate desires. Some, of course, are possible, such as Mr. Weasley's. But these mirrors aren't predictions, nor do they give us knowledge or truth. You should know that, because you know that you won't see your family while you are alive. Men have wasted away before it, entranced by what they have seen, or been driven mad, not knowing if what it shows is real or even possible.

"The Mirror will be moved to a new home tomorrow, Harry, and I ask you not to go looking for it again. If you ever _do _run across it, you will now be prepared." Harry frowned, but didn't say anything to the last part. "It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live, remember that. Now–"

"Sorry to interrupt, sir, but I disagree," Harry said, his frown etched deeper into his face now. "Dwelling on dreams doesn't make you forget to live, but _reminds_ you to live. Wishing to see my parents doesn't harm me, but pushes me forward to be someone they'd be proud of, you know? While I suppose that's not true for everyone, it works for Ron, too. Because he saw himself like that, he'll probably be even more motivated to show he's just as good as his brothers." He fell silent, only now wondering if he'd be punished for interrupting the Headmaster.

The Headmaster didn't seem angry, though. Instead, he was staring into the mirror with a distant expression, obviously thinking about what Harry had said. Harry looked into the mirror again to see his parents and a few other relatives sitting on the ground, too. His mother was playing with his father's hair, apparent love on her face as his father said something he couldn't hear, and his mother laughing. Harry wished he knew what their voices were like. He looked away.

Student and Headmaster sat together in a companionable silence for several minutes before the older wizard finally blinked and looked away. He smiled down at Harry. "I think I, and my sister," he said, nodding at the mirror, "have to agree with you." Before Harry could ask him what he meant, he continued talking. "Now, why don't you put that admirable cloak back on and get off to bed?"

Harry stood up, still pondering what the Headmaster had said earlier. "Good night, sir." As he left, he decided to ask Hermione when she got back to help him find on Dumbledore while they continued to research Flamel. Because of what his professor had said, he was now actually interested in learning some more history. His headmaster seemed like a man worth knowing.


	11. The Free Dragon

**The Free Dragon**  
_What if the Trio had a different idea for what to do with Norbert?_

Something about the smile lurking on Malfoy's face during the next week made Harry, Ron, and Hermione very nervous. They spent most of their free time in Hagrid's darkened hut, trying to reason with him.

"Just let him go," Harry urged. "Set him free."

"I can't," said Hagrid. "He's too little. He'd die."

They looked at the dragon. It had grown three times in length in just a week. Smoke kept furling out of it's nostrils. Hagrid hadn't been doing his gamekeeping duties because the dragon was keeping him so busy. There were empty brandy bottles and chicken feathers all over the floor.

"I've decided to call him Norbert," said Hagrid, looking at the dragon with misty eyes. "He really knows me now, watch. Norbert! Norbert! Where's Mommy?"

"He's lost his marbles," Ron muttered in Harry's ear.

"Hagrid," Harry said loudly, "Give it two weeks and Norbert's gonig to be as long as your house. Malfoy could go to Dumbledore at any moment."

Hagrid bit his lip.

"I - I know I can't keep him forever, but I can't jus' dump him, I can't."

Harry scratched his head in thought.

"Wait! What about the forest? The Forbidden Forest? You're like the only person who goes in there, Hagrid."

"I don't know, Harry," said Hermione. "I don't think the forest is _that _big. Would if a teacher or a student found Norbert?"

"Well, any smart person would just start running, and no one would be able to blame the dragon on Hagrid! It'd all work out."

Harry's three friends frowned, but after working out the details, they went along with it. After a tearful goodbye from Hagrid, Norbert was moved deep into the forest.

* * *

"Quidditch practice again?" Hermione asked, glaring at Harry.

"There's a game coming up soon," Ron helpfully reminded.

"That's no excuse for not doing his homework! He'll be up all night working on the Transfiguration essay."

"It's all about priorities, Hermione."

"Priorities! I'll give you prior-"

"Hey! Guys! What do you think's going on?" asked Harry, looking towards the Head Table. There was a student, probably in his 4th or 5th year, standing in front of the Headmaster and wringing his hands.

Abruptly, Dumbledore stood and called for the students' attention, and the mass of children quickly quieted. "We seem to have a missing student. Has anyone seen Jacob Littleton recently? He was last seen entering the west side of the Forbidden Forest, apparently on a dare." At this, the Headmaster turned to stare penetratingly at the student in front of him, who stared at the floor and shifted his feet nervously. "Several tracking spells have been attempted, but he still has not been found. If any student can come forward with more information, please do so."

Hermioned turned to her two friends nervously. "Tracking spells done right only don't work when the person has other magic preventing him from being found or if the person is..._dead_," she said, the last part a harsh whisper.

"You don't think-" Harry started.

"No," said Ron, shaking his head vehemently. "There's just no way. It can't be."

As the Hogwart's students buzzed excitedly on this new information, no one noticed the three unaturally pale Gryffindor students who seemed to be the only ones who didn't want to voice their opinion on the missing student.


	12. The Captured Quirrell

**The Captured Quirrell  
**_What if Harry had a better reaction time when fighting with Quirrell for the stone?_**  
**

Quirrell cursed under his breath.

"I don't understand...is the Stone _inside _the mirror? Should I break it?"

Harry's mind was racing.

_What I want more than anything else in the world at the moment, _he thought, _is to find the Stone before Quirrell does. So if I look in the mirror, I should see myself finding it – which means I'll see where it's hidden! But how can I look without Quirrell realizing what I'm up to?_

He tried to edge to the left, to get in front of the glass without Quirrell noticing, but the ropes around his ankles were too tight: he tripped and fell over. Quirrell ignored him. He was still talking to himself.

"What does this mirror do? How does it work? Help me, Master!"

And to Harry's horror, a voice answered, and the voice seemed to come from Quirrell himself.

"Use the boy...Use the boy..."

Quirrell rounded on Harry.

"Yes – Potter – come here."

He clapped his hands once, the ropes binding Harry fell off. Harry got slowly to his feet.

"Come here," Quirrell repeated. "Look in the mirror and tell me what you see."

Harry walked toward him.

_I must lie,_ he thought desperately. _I must look and lie about what I see, that's all_.

Quirrell moved close behind him. Harry breathed in the funny smell that seemed to come from Quirrell's turban. He closed his eyes, stepped in front of the mirror, and opened them again.

He saw his reflection, pale and scared-looking at first. But a moment later, the reflection smiled at him. It put its hand into its pocket and pulled out a blood-red stone. It winked and put the Stone back in its pocket – and as it did so, Harry felt something heavy drop into his real pocket. Somehow – incredibly – _he'd gotten the Stone._

"Well?" said Quirrell impatiently. "What do you see?"

Harry screwed up his courage.

"I see myself shaking hands with Dumbledore," he invented. "I – I've won the house cup for Gryffindor."

Quirrell cursed again.

"Get out of the way," he said. As Harry moved aside, he felt the Sorcerer's Stone against his leg. Dare he make a break for it?

But he hadn't walked five paces before a high voice spoke, though Quirrell wasn't moving his lips.

"He lies...He lies..."

"Potter, come back here!" Quirrell shouted. "Tell me the truth! What did you just see?"

The high voice spoke again.

"Let me speak to him...face-to-face..."

"Master, you are not strong enough!"

"I have strength enough...for this..."

Harry felt as if Devil's Snare was rooting him to the spot. He couldn't move a muscle. Petrified, he watched as Quirrell reached up and began to unwrap his turban. What was going on? The turban fell away. Quirrell's head looked strangely small without it. Then he turned slowly on the spot.

Harry would have screamed, but he couldn't make a sound. Where there should have been a back to Quirrell's head, there was a face, the most terrible face Harry had ever seen. It was chalk white with glaring red eyes and slits for nostrils, like a snake.

"Harry Potter..." it whispered.

Harry tried to take a step backward but his legs wouldn't move.

"See what I have become?" the face said. "Mere shadow and vapor...I have form only when I can share another's body...but there have always been those willing to let me into their hearts and minds...Unicorn blood has strengthened me, these past weeks...you saw faithful Quirrell drinking it for me in the forest...and once I have the Elixir of Life, I will be able to create a body of my own...Now...why don't you give me that Stone in your pocket?"

So he knew. The feeling suddenly surged back into Harry's legs. He stumbled backward.

"Don't be a fool," snarled the face. "Better save your own life and join me...or you'll meet the same end as your parents...They died begging me for mercy..."

"LIAR!" Harry shouted suddenly.

Quirrell was walking backward at him, so that Voldemort could still see him. The evil face was now smiling.

"How touching..." it hissed. "I always value bravery...Yes, boy, your parents were brave...I killed your father first, and he put up a courageous fight...but your mother needn't have died...she was trying to protect you...Now give me the Stone, unless you want her to have died in vain."

"NEVER!"

Harry sprang toward the flame door, but Voldemort screamed "SEIZE HIM!" and the next second, Harry felt Quirrell's hand close on his wrist. At once, a needle-sharp pain seared across Harry's scar; his head felt as though it was about to split in two; he yelled, struggling with all his might, and to his surprise, Quirrell let go of him. The pain in his head lessened – he looked around wildly to see where Quirrell had gone, and saw him hunched in pain, looking at his fingers – they were blistering before his eyes.

Harry reared back, acting instinctively. He pushed Quirrell away with all his might, adrenaline pumping through his veins. He finally remembered that he was holding a wand in his left hand, and yelled out the first spell he could think of.

"_Petrificus Totalus_!"

The Body-Bind Curse took effect immediately, turning Quirrell to stone and finally giving Harry the change to run toward the flame door.

His eyes took in all the potions, then he made a grab for the one Hermione had drank earlier to go back and help Ron. He took a gulp of the potion, ignoring the freezing sensation, and also grabbed the bottle need to go towards the mirror. He stepped through the flames, then smashed the two bottles on the floor.

That done, he checked that he still had his wand and that he still had the Stone. Then his vision started fading and he fell to the ground in relief.

* * *

Harry woke to bright white. He assumed he was in the hospital wing, but didn't remember arriving there. Voices were talking near him, and he tried to focus.

"Harry? Harry, are you alright?" the kindly face of the Headmaster stared down at him.

"What?" he croaked out. "Is Ron okay? Did you find Quirrell?"

"Everything is quite fine, my dear boy. Your friends are safe, the Stone is saved, and Quirrell is being held in custody." The Headmaster frowned. "You are lucky you escaped when you did, Harry, Quirrell came close to killing you."

Harry leaned back in his bed as student and headmaster discussed what had happened. Both were curious to see what they would learn from the possessed Quirrell as soon as the man awoke.

* * *

A/N: Check out my other story, Changes in Times of War.


	13. The Charming Wizard

**The Charming Wizard**_  
What if Harry was better prepared for the second task?_

Harry opened his eyes. He was still in the library; the Invisibility Cloak had slipped off his head as he'd slept, and the side of his face was stuck to the pages of _Where There's a Wand, There's a Way._ He sat up, straightening his glass, blinking in the bright daylight.

"Harry Potter needs to hurry!" squeaked Dobby. "The second task starts in ten minutes, and Harry Potter-"

"Ten minutes?" Harry croaked. "Ten – _ten minutes?_"

He looked down at his watch. Dobby was right. It was twenty past nine.

Harry abruptly slapped his hand to his forehead, jumped out of his chair, stuffed his Invisibility Cloak in his bag, and then tore out of the library with Dobby at his heels.

Of all the things he had prepared for, he had somehow _forgot to set an alarm?_

"Dobby is supposed to be in the kitchens, sir!" Dobby squealed as they burst into the corridor. "Dobby will be missed – good luck, Harry Potter, sir, good luck!"

"See you later, Dobby!" Harry shouted, and he sprinted along the corridor and down the stairs, three at a time.

The entrance hall contained a few last-minute stragglers, all leaving the Great Hall after breakfast and heading through the double oak doors to watch the second task. They stared as Harry flashed past, sending Colin and Dennis Creevey flying as he leapt down the stone steps and out onto the bright, chilly grounds.

As he pounded down the lawn he saw that the seats that had encircled the dragons' enclosure in November were now ranged along the opposite bank, rising in stands that were packed to the bursting point and reflected in the lake below. The excited babble of the crowd echoed strangely across the water as Harry ran flat-out around the other side of the lake toward the judges, who were sitting at another gold-draped table at the water's edge. Cedric, Fleur, and Krum were beside the judges' table, watching Harry sprint toward them.

"I'm...here..." Harry panted, skidding to a halt in the mud and accidentally splattering Fleur's robes. With a muted apology, Harry cast a quick charm to clean Fleur's robes for her.

"Where have you been?" said a bossy, disapproving voice. "The task's about to start!"

"Well, I'm here now!" Harry gasped out, ignoring Percy Weasley.

Dumbledore smiled at Harry, but Karkaroff and Madame Maxime didn't look at all pleased to see him...It was obvious from the looks on their faces that they had thought he wasn't going to turn up.

Harry bent over, hands on his knees, gasping for breath; he had a stitch in his side that felt as though he had a knife between his ribs, but there was no time to get rid of it; Ludo Bagman was now moving among the champions, spacing them along the bank at intervals of ten feet. Harry was on the very end of the line, next to Krum, who was wearing swimming trunks and was holding his wand ready.

Damn, he should have thought of wearing swim trunks.

"All right, Harry?" Bagman whispered as he moved Harry a few feet farther away from Krum. "Know what you're going to do?"

"Yeah," Harry panted, massaging his ribs.

Bagman gave Harry's shoulder a quick squeeze and returned to the judges' table; he pointed his wand at his throat as he had done at the World Cup, said, "_Sonorus!_" and his voice boomed out across the dark water toward the stands.

"Well, all our champions are ready for the second task, which will start on my whistle. They have precisely an hour to recover what has been taken from them. On the count of three, then. One...two..._three!_"

The whistle echoed shrilly in the cold, still air; the stands erupted with cheers and applause; without looking to see what the other champions were doing, Harry quickly changed his boxers to swim trunks, and banished the rest of his clothes to fold in a neat pile next to the judges' table. There were a few whistles as his bare skin was suddenly exposed to the air around them, but Harry ignored the attention with practiced ease.

Then, as Harry cast a Disillusionment Charm, the black-haired wizard disappeared to most of the audience.

Fleur Delacour and Cedric Diggory could both be seen casting the expected Bubble-Head Charms, the most obvious solution to breathing under water.

Viktor Krum managed a partial Transfiguration into a shark, and quickly dove into the water.

However, while some in the audience were groaning at not being able to see Harry, those with practiced eyes saw tiny splashes on the surface of the water near where Harry had started, and, minutes later, a much larger splash could be seen near the middle of the lake.

Screens were on display for the audience to watch the action, but none could find the image of Harry Potter. After ten minutes of gasps and groans and cheers from the crowd as they watched the happenings of three of the champions, discussions began to run rampant throughout the makeshift stadium as the hostage Ron Weasley suddenly disappeared altogether, his bindings left behind and ripped to shreds.

The students watched with bated breath as they waited to see what Harry Potter would do.

A wave of water gushed up near the edge of the water, very close to the judges' table. Some coughing ensued, and then Harry Potter's voice could be heard muttering the counter to the Disillusionment Charm. The black-haired young wizard and his red-haired hostage appeared, both soaking wet and swearing.

There was a minute of shocked silence, then cheering rang out through the students, and Ludo Bagman seemed to worship his very name, amazed that the youngest champion had arrived back in only 17 minutes.

* * *

"Harry, I'm afraid that since you were quite well disguised, we require an explanation on how you retrieved young Ron Weasley. I believe all of us are quite curious." Dumbledore's blue eyes were staring at Harry quite intently, his old hands folded neatly in his lap.

Harry smirked. After the disastrous first task, he had decided to be much more prepared for the second.

"I cast on myself right away the Disillusionment Charm and the Visual Body Projection Charm so I couldn't be easily seen. Then the No Scent and the Silencing Charm and the Featherweight Charm all on myself. I used a Point Me to find Ron, and followed it out to the middle of the lake – I walked on the water. Once my wand told me I was right above Ron, I cast a Mermaid Kick Charm, Bubble-Head Charm, and then cancelled the Featherweight Charm. I dove straight down to Ron; any creatures I passed barely noticed me. A Severing Charm on the plants holding him, a Featherweight Charm on Ron so he was easier to carry, and then I swam back to the surface. And here we are."

Some of the judges had disgruntled scowls on their faces as Dumbledore shot them smug looks.


	14. The RedHanded Elf

**The Red-Handed Elf**

_What if Dobby had been seen dropping the pudding at 4 Privet Drive by someone other than Harry?_

Before Harry could move, Dobby had darted to the bedroom door, pulled it open, and sprinted down the stairs.

Mouth dry, stomach lurching, Harry sprang after him, trying not to make a sound. He jumped the last six steps, landing catlike on the hall carpet, looking around for Dobby. From the dining room he heard Uncle Vernon saying, "...tell Petunia that very funny story about those American plumbers, Mr. Mason. She's been dying to hear..."

Harry ran up the hall into the kitchen and felt his stomach disappear.

Aunt Petunia's masterpiece of a pudding, the mountain of cream and sugared violets, was floating up near the ceiling. On top of a cupboard in the corner crouched Dobby.

"No," croaked Harry. "Please...they'll kill me..."

"Harry Potter must say he's not going back to school-"

"Dobby...please..."

"Say it, sir-"

"I can't-"

Dobby gave him a tragic look.

"Then Dobby must do it, sir, for Harry Potter's own good."

The pudding fell to the floor with a heart-stopping crash. Cream splattered the windows and walls as the dish shattered.

There were screams from the dining room, and Uncle Vernon burst into the kitchen, just in time to see Harry, covered from head to foot in Aunt Petunia's pudding, grab Dobby by the throat of his pillowcase from the top of the cupboard.

"What the bloody hell is that?" his uncle boomed out, catching sight of Dobby. Mr. Mason, wanting to see what the commotion was about, had followed Uncle Vernon into the kitchen right as Dobby snapped his fingers with a crack and vanished right out of Harry's clenched fist.

"What the bloody hell was that?" repeated Mr. Mason.

xxxxx

Harry stared sullenly at the wall in his small bedroom. He had a pile of letters in front of him at his desk, but he had answered all of them earlier that evening and was waiting on a response. He had been stuck in his room all day, and he had yet to even get fed.

Despite Harry's fairly pathetic attempts at lying to Mr. Mason about what he had seen, the man had still gone off in a rant about witchcraft and lunatics and had even tried to punch Harry in the face. The couple had left shortly, Mrs. Mason very confused and nearly hysterical. The boy wizard had received a letter about inappropriate usage of underage magic, and he had written back to explain the situation, not sure if he was going to be in trouble with the law or not.

Obliviators showed up fairly quickly, but not until after his Uncle Vernon had gone into a rage at him and slammed him against the wall by the neck. Harry had tried to convince the Ministry employees to obliviate his family, too, but they seemed to misunderstand him and assured him that it wouldn't be necessary.

A day had passed since, and Harry had only been allowed out of the room to use the toilet. His only consolation was that, according to a brief investigation by the Ministry, Dobby the house-elf belonged to the Malfoy family. That meant the elf was brought into line, Harry was able to get his letters back, and the whole thing about a murder plot at Hogwarts must have been an elaborate if slightly convoluted plan by Draco Malfoy to get him to stay away from Hogwarts.

At least he wouldn't have any crazy adventures or be involved in any dangerous plots this year, he'd already had enough of that, thank you very much.


End file.
